Essential Guide to Blood Groups 3rd Edition

A short, up-to-date text on blood groups, for people working or training in the field of blood transfusion, transplantation, or human genetics, but who are not specialising in the field of blood groups, the third edition of Essential Guide to Blood Groups is a pocket-sized book, containing full colour text together with schematic figures and tables. The book comprises an introduction to blood groups, followed by chapters on techniques, information on various blood groups, antibodies, quality assurance in immunohaematology, and it concludes with chapters on troubleshooting in the laboratory, and FAQs. It also covers the serology, inheritance, biochemistry and molecular genetics of the most important blood group systems.

CONTENTS:

1 An introduction to blood groupsWhat is a blood group?Blood group antibodiesClinical importance of blood groupsBiological importance of blood groupsBlood group systemsBlood group terminology and classification

3 The ABO blood groupsIntroductionABO antigens, antibodies, and inheritanceA1 and A2Antigen, phenotype, and gene frequenciesABO antibodiesImportance of the ABO system to transfusion and transplantation medicineBiochemical nature of the ABO antigensBiosynthesis of the ABO antigens and ABO molecular geneticsH, the precursor of A and BABH secretionH-deficient red cellsFurther complexitiesAcquired changesAssociations with disease and functional aspects

5 Other blood groupsThe Kell systemThe Duffy systemThe Kidd systemThe MNS systemThe Diego systemThe Lewis systemSome other blood group systemsAntigens that do not belong to a blood group system

6 Clinical significance of blood group antibodiesAntibody production and structureFactors affecting the clinical significance of antibodiesHaemolytic transfusion reactions (HTR)Haemolytic disease of the fetus and newborn (HDFN)AutoantibodiesTests to assess the potential significance of an antibodyDecision-making for transfusion

7 Blood grouping from DNAFetal blood groupingBlood group typing of patients and donorsNext generation sequencingThe future of blood group serology

8 Quality assurance in immunohaematologyAchieving total qualityFrequency and specificity of control materialQuality requirements for safe transfusion practiceChecklist of critical control pointsLaboratory errors, root cause analysis (RCA) and corrective and preventative action (CAPA)